What Are The Differences Between JWs Born In and Converted?

by minimus 39 Replies latest jw friends

  • LV101
    LV101

    President Trump acknowledges and respects the uneducated, blue collar, or average, worker, that he was referencing. Many in nanny states that voted for Ole Hil are uneducated and don't even speak the English language fluently. Like ole Hil says re/her base, "they're so needy."

  • minimus
    minimus

    Ohnightdivine... I think many people can relate to what you wrote

  • Still Totally ADD
    Still Totally ADD

    OK . I was not making a political statement. I was just saying those who are educated are more likely to join a Cult. Which falls inline with the topic of this thread. Still Totally ADD

  • truth_b_known
    truth_b_known

    It's far easier for a converted person to leave because their pre-cult support system never left them. My wife converted in her late 20s. She was only in for about 2 years when we met. Prior to becoming a Witness nearly her entire support system family and relatives, none of which liked her becoming a Witness, but went along with it.

    I was born in. My parents were never close to their family when I grew up. In my high school years and early adult life I had cultivated friendships with non-Witnesses and Witnesses who were inactive. The majority of my support group were Witnesses.

    For my wife it was as nothing changed other than she went back to celebrating holidays with family and relatives.

    For me the only thing that helped was I had my closest friends who all had left the organization ahead of me and an ever growing number of friends I met through my line of work.

  • LongHairGal
    LongHairGal

    MINIMUS:

    I came in as a young adult who was interested in end-time prophecy and was led to believe Jehovah’s Witnesses had the answers. They were not honest about this and other things. The religion was misrepresented to me.

    I suppose the difference between myself and born-ins was that I had a pre-cult personality and knew what the world was about. I agree with TRUTHBKNOWN about this. My relatives and friends did not agree with me getting involved with the Witnesses. Later on I knew they were right😁.

    Luckily, I didn’t fall for the bullshit of single women doing favors for users. I refused to be targeted!! It was also easy to plan my ‘fade’ when the time was right. I wasn’t scared to leave like a born-in might be..Thankfully, I was also never foolish enough to quit my full-time job to appease control freaks and jealous idiots and am retired now.

    I did waste time, but since I’ve been out about eighteen years that doesn’t bother me now since it seems far in the past like a job I had many years ago.

  • Vidiot
    Vidiot
    minimus - "What are the differences between JWs born-in and converted?"

    Born-ins wanna leave... converts wanna enter. :smirk:

  • All or nothing
    All or nothing

    I guess It was cognitive dissonance at work in me, long before I even knew what that was... I used to meditate on this very subject. I observed Jws that converted as adults having a more intense over the top spirituality. They were jw fanatical. I was a born in and my friends and I struggled with living a "double" life as Jws call it, but now I realize it was just our need and want to be and feel normal. I found the cult like ways of the adult jw converts border-line repulsive. Of course, I have observed many born ins with this same behavior, obviously because of all the meetings aka indoctrination sessions. I realize now how all the brain washing has affected me as well. The doctrines that bother me the most are the ones I believed and did my best to obey, but Others didn't and then these doctrines become null,and void, due to them being ignored but the greater number. When you bring them up, brainwashed Jws actually say, no we were never told that. YES WE WERE- I was there. I am of course talking about the don't have kids in this system doctrine. Just because now a days - last 20 years or so, most are going against this suggestion, doesn't mean I wasn't raised to not be normal and start a family. The GB is well aware that the only growth happening is the kids- the same kids we weren't supposed to have...so all the Dont have kids brainwashing has suddenly stopped🙄🤔

  • OnTheWayOut
    OnTheWayOut
    I tend to think that many JWs who joined the religion in their later years feel foolish or are embarrassed by their decision to become one of Jehovah’s Witnesses.
    Well, yeah. I was exposed to it, stayed clear of it, then let it fully into my young adult life willingly.

    But I figured it all out through therapy.






  • steve2
    steve2

    If you convert to JW organization as an adult, greater likelihood you will have connections with family and friends who are not JWs. And if you have not married a JW by the time you join, high likelihood your spouse will still be by your side when you leave.

    Easier to leave when you’re not born- or raised-in the religion.

  • JeffT
    JeffT

    In 1972-73 I got caught up in the 1975 nonsense. It was my senior year in college, I was depressed and had no idea where my life was going. I was very vulnerable, and the local congregation was small and close knit. I liked the people (and probably still would if they would talk to me). Some parts of JW doctrine (neutrality, no trinity, no hell) made sense to me, I thought it was the truth.

    My wife converted at about the same time, some members of her family were JW's, but not all. We were married at the Hall in 1974. By about 1980 we knew something was wrong, but it took some time, and a move, to break free.

    As noted by others, for both of us it was a return to pre-cult living. My family (totally not religious) and the non-JW parts of her family welcomed us back to the real world. I think the transition was much easier because we had a support system waiting for us.

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